The present invention relates to embodiments of an apparatus and method for determining the operation of a vehicle safety system. Commercial vehicles often include safety systems such as lane departure warning, active cruise control with braking and stability control. Each of these systems includes sensors and/or cameras configured for providing input to facilitate the functions of the safety system. If one of the sensors and/or cameras is determined to not be working properly because no images or objects are detected within a predetermined time period, the vehicle safety system is deactivated. In some instances, the safety system will not be re-enabled until the vehicle is powered on again, the fault codes are cleared and/or the sensor is replaced. Shutting down the operation of the vehicle safety system may not be desirable in certain situations, such as long stretches of country highway, where simply the lack of detectable objects in the field of view of the sensor is causing the sensor to not detect an object.